This portable battery can fully recharge your MacBook on the go

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Anker
USB Type-C is steadily morphing into the standard for tomorrow's smartphones, tablets, and laptops, and with good reason: It can work across devices, it's fast, and it's capable of unifying the mess of cables we usually have into one consolidated standard.

That's tomorrow, though. Today, anyone with a USB-C device such as the Apple MacBook or Huawei Nexus 6P is probably dealing with compatibility issues, especially if the cable that came with the device has USB-C connectors at both ends. Since most accessories still rely on the traditional USB and microUSB, that makes it so you have to grab a separate cable to make your gadgets play nice. This is convoluted.

Slowly but surely, however, things are starting to level out. If you want to charge those newer devices away from an outlet, for instance, there are now a handful of USB-C compatible portable batteries that make doing so a little more convenient.

The best of those, so far, looks to be the Anker PowerCore+ 20100. It's big, heavy, and decidedly not for your pockets, but that's because it holds a ton of power. (Anker rates it at 20,100mAh, but, per usual, the available capacity is a little bit less than that.) Because of that, and because it comes with a USB-C port, it's capable of fully refilling a dead MacBook, with a little bit of juice to spare.

The hook is that there's still a couple of a regular USB ports on top of that, so you have the flexibility of refilling other gadgets as you charge your USB-C device. (On its own, your smartphone can get around 4-7 refills, depending on its size.) Like other Anker packs, the whole thing is smooth and sturdy, too, and a handy 10-point LED ring around its power button shows you how much juice the battery has left.

Having that USB-C port adds to the cost here, so you should only really get this if you're stuck with a USB-C to USB-C cable already, or you're just eager to prepare for the future. (The standard Anker PowerCore is still an excellent big battery for everyone else.) And either way, a battery this big is more for flights and extended time away more than a casual night out. It also takes a long time to charge.

Nevertheless, this is another good device from a company we've found reliable more times than we can count. If you're all in on USB-C, it should make for a dependable travel companion.

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